Sierra Tango 205, descent to 500, bearing 158.
Sierra Tango, do you copy?
MAN (over radio): Burkhart Tower, this is Hotel 33,
Foxtrot coming up on runway two for takeoff.
Coming up on Runway two for takeoff.
Hotel Foxtrot, please stand by.
Burkhart Tower, this is Sierra Tango, descending to 500.
(clattering over radio) Whoa, it's bumpy up here.
Sierra Tango, please repeat.
He's headed into crosswinds.
Yeah, I know.
What do you got?
(on radio): I'm having trouble holding it.
I see him.
Neil, you've got him coming in to runway two.
(alarm sounding)
Burkhart Tower, this is Hotel Foxtrot on runway two.
Mayday, Mayday. He's flying right at us.
Get him out of the way, Neil.
Sierra Tango, turn south to 170 immediately.
One-seven-zero.
Get him off the runway.
Take over, Matt.
Burkhart Tower, this is Hotel Foxtrot, please advise.
Hotel 333 Foxtrot,
take evasive action!
Take evasive action immediately.
(on radio): We're taking evasive action.
(alarm blaring)
(over radio): He missed. We're okay.
He missed.
Burkhart Tower, this is Sierra Tango.
We are safe and on the ground.
(wind whistling)
Neil, you all right?
What was that about?
I'm sorry, man.
I just lost track of my ground positions.
You froze up. Yeah, I know.
I, uh... look, I'm not feeling too good.
You mind if I go home?
And Patrick's here; he's already in the chair.
Yeah, go ahead.
Um, okay.
Can you get that message through to my cell phone?
Thank you. Sorry I'm late.
It took me two hours to get here from the city.
What do we got? Neil Rawlings, 38.
His son, Owen, 17.
Neil is an air traffic controller
at Burkhart Regional. Is the mom around?
Not anymore, she died in a car accident a year ago.
Who called it in? The security company.
(alarm chirping)
When the alarm went off at 10:18 last night,
the security company called here.
This is a recording of that call.
(alarm wailing) Hello?
WOMAN: Good evening, this is First On-Site Security Center.
NEIL: It's, it's P-2571.
I'm not going anywhere, you understand me?
MAN: We need to talk. I'm warning you, man.
You need to fix this. You need to go.
Hold on, hold on. WOMAN: Sir, is everything okay?
MAN (shouting): You need to fix this!
(dial tone)
WOMAN: Sir, are you there?
That's it.
PD showed up within the hour.
Nobody was here, nothing's been taken.
I thought you should know
the lady across the street saw a blue Mercedes
peeling out of here when the alarm went off.
Did she get a license plate?
No, but she thinks it was a man driving.
SAMANTHA: All right, get me a description.
(glass breaking) (alarm blaring)
This guy should have stayed in the control tower.
Neil's one of my best guys.
Military trained, handy with computers.
So were you surprised when he called in sick yesterday?
Yeah, he never misses work.
What time was that?
Around 6:30 a.m.
Now, has he been acting strange lately?
How do you mean?
Odd phone calls,
fights with coworkers, things like that.
I thought somebody broke into his house.
Yeah, but it doesn't look like it was a robbery.
We're actually trying to determine
whether someone had it out for Neil or his son.
He did have a tough time landing a plane his last shift,
which is out of character.
But in Neil's defense, it was a bitch of a snowstorm.
Are you telling me he made a mistake?
Look, you got to understand,
at any given time
an ATC has a dozen different factors affecting each plane.
You add to that the lives in your hands,
and it's a pretty unforgiving job.
That still doesn't answer my question.
He froze up for a second,
but considering
all the scrutiny my guys have been under,
I'd say he deserves a break.
What do you mean "scrutiny"?
We had an incident the other day.
Echo Charlie 527, turn southwest at one-niner-five.
Winds at 220, at one two.
Report airport in sight.
Chris.
You mind taking over?
Ken.
Come here.
What's up?
I'm not sure.
But you know Ghalib Al-Nian?
Yeah? What about him?
I just landed his twin-engine Piper,
but before he came in,
he was... he was circling the power plant at Green.
You tell him it was restricted air space?
Yeah, yeah, but he kept going below minimum altitude.
Whew! That's not good.
He had a passenger with him.
Every time he called in, I heard Arabic on his frequency.
We're going to need to report this.
What if it's, what if it's nothing, though?
What if he was just being stupid?
That's a risky what if.
It's going to kick up a lot of dirt, Ken.
We've got to cover our asses, Neil.
I called it in.
The next day DHS was here grilling us.
And this guy, Ghalib...?
Ghalib Al-Nian.
He's been flying out of here
for a couple years.
Now, did DHS arrest him?
Not that I know.
But he was furious we reported him.
Is there any chance
that he knew Neil was the one who turned him in?
Wouldn't have been hard to figure out.
Hey.
We found Neil's son at his aunt's house in Tarrytown.
He's been there about a week.
They're on their way in.
Do we have anything on the, uh, blood
that was found in Neil's kitchen?
Yeah, it's O positive.
I'm waiting on his military records to see if it matches.
Okay.
Ghalib owns a blue Mercedes
just like the one seen leaving Neil's house.
And does DHS still have him in custody?
No, it turns out
he had authorization to fly over that power plant,
because his engineering firm is retrofitting the site.
Paperwork never made it to the tower,
but they did detain his cousin who was with him.
Why?
He's been donating money to a mosque in Beirut
that houses Shi'ite radicals.
That would do it.
Yeah.
Do we have any idea where Ghalib is right now?
Yeah, he's on an aerial survey in New Jersey.
We got people waiting to pick him up as soon as he lands.
Okay.
Agent Malone? Uh-huh?
Owen Rawlings is here.
Okay, uh, thank you.
Hey, Jack.
Mm-hmm. Um...
I called up to Anne's office
to get some help with this aviation stuff, and uh,
they said she doesn't work here anymore.
That's right.
Um, from now on you should contact Agent Vasquez,
he's taking care of it.
When was the last time you saw your dad?
Four days ago.
He came by my aunt's
to drop off some stuff I left at home.
Why are you staying at your aunt's?
Because my dad's an ass.
Owen,
stop.
We haven't gotten along since my mom died.
Did you have a fight?
One of many.
Anything different about this one?
I don't know.
Tell him what you told me, Owen.
This guy came by the house.
I'm done, okay?
You need to find yourself somebody else.
You think it's that easy?
I really don't care.
Dad?
What's going on?
Just, just go upstairs, son.
That your boy? Yeah.
You need to go, and don't come back.
Then don't give me a reason to.
Who was that? Nobody.
What are you mixed up in, Dad?
You don't need to know, son. What the hell
do you know what I need?
You don't even know what cereal I like.
Don't start. Why?
So you can keep pretending I don't exist?
That's enough. Mom's dead, remember?
You can't pawn me off on her anymore.
I said that's enough!
The next day, he sent me away; said it'd be good for me.
He was just trying to get rid of me.
That's not true.
Your dad loves you.
My dad doesn't love anyone
or anything since mom died.
No, it just feels that way.
It's been hard on both of you.
Ever seen this man with your dad?
I don't think so.
His name is Ghalib Al-Nian.
I've never heard of him.
What about the guy who came to your house?
Seen him before?
Nope.
ELENA: Okay, yeah.
Thank you so much. (hangs up receiver)
So Neil's blood type doesn't match the blood at the house,
so it might belong to the intruder
or what about the son, what do you think?
Well, the kid didn't look hurt to me.
But his mom crashed
at an intersection near their house, and, apparently,
he and his father saw the whole thing.
Wow. That's got to be tough.
Mm-hmm, and Neil's credit card records indicate
that he's been a regular at a bar in Tarrytown.
If that happened to me,
I might be in there every single night. Yeah.
He also owes $145,000
for his wife's hospital bills.
And what's all this?
These are flight plans and transcripts
from Neil's airport, and I've been trying to decipher
the numbers for hours, and I cannot figure it out.
Talk about a job that'll drive you to drink.
Well, if you help me, guess what?
I'll buy the martinis.
I'm worth more than that.
Those are the tail numbers we're looking for.
Ghalib Al-Nian? That you?
Yes. FBI.
I already spoke to Homeland Security.
I'm not a terrorist.
Then why did you go after Neil Rawlings?
What?
Last night somebody saw a car
that looks just like yours leaving Neil's house.
And now he's missing.
I don't know where he is.
But you were there last night.
Ghalib, a government employee
is missing and you're the primary suspect.
You want to keep giving Homeland Security ammunition?
Fine.
I was there.
But I went to confront him
because this whole mess is killing my family.
But when I got there,
it all got turned around.
Rawlings was in his kitchen.
Do you hear me?
My cousin was just visiting me, Rawlings,
and now he's been disappeared somewhere.
I was doing my job.
And what do you think I was doing?
I can't deal with this right now.
All you got to say is that
we didn't do anything!
Listen! Do you know what you're putting my family through?
Neil! I'm done with this, Ghalib!
(glass breaking, alarm blaring)
What the hell is going on here? (phone ringing)
You need to leave.
I'm not going anywhere.
Hello?
(alarm blaring)
It's P2571.
I'm not going anywhere, you understand me?
No, I'm warning you. We need to talk about this.
I'm warning you, man. You need to go.
You need to fix this. Hold on. Get out of here!
Get out of my house! Go!
Get out! Hey! Hey!
(alarm blaring)
I got the hell out of there.
I mean, this guy was insane.
Was there anyone else there?
Not that I saw.
Well, then whose blood was all over Neil?
I don't know.
But there was a lot of it.
Anything else out of Ghalib?
Nope. That's his story and he's sticking to it.
Well, I've had no luck ID'ing the guy
who was harassing him at his house, so...
You know what?
I'll look into violent crimes around that area.
I spoke to the bartender
of the bar where Neil drinks.
His drinking buddy is none other
than Karen Murphy.
His sister-in-law?
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Must be hard losing a sister.
She meant the world to me.
Sometimes people cope
with the loss of someone close to them
in interesting ways.
I'm not sure what you mean.
You having an affair with your brother-in-law?
Excuse me?
You've been seen drinking with him
on a regular basis at the Courtyard Hotel.
We get together to talk.
And uh, then retire for a night
of familial intimacy.
Bartender said you were
all over each other by last call.
It just sort of happened, all right?
After Kirsten died, we connected.
It helped. Why didn't you tell us
this before?
Because Owen was there.
Anyway, it's over.
Neil broke it off last week.
Karen, stop.
What, did somebody see us? No, no, no, stop.
Just stop. Stop!
I can't do this.
Just... stop.
What are you talking about?
This is messed up, all right?
This whole situation is...
What would Kirsten say?
I don't understand. What's changed?
Nothing.
Nothing has changed, that's the problem.
It's been a year, and we're still...
still sneaking around.
You need this as much as I do.
I need to take care of my son.
Don't make this about him.
It is about him, okay?
Ever since Kirsten died,
Owen's practically been on his own.
I'm sorry.
I need to start fixing things.
All right? This is not about you.
(scoffs)
(sighing)
We argued for awhile.
And then I had to leave to pick up Owen.
And these things that he had to fix,
any idea what they were?
No.
I asked, he wouldn't tell me.
Hey, Danny. Yeah?
Come here, please.
What's up? So every control tower
records its radio transmissions, right? Right.
I've been listening to Neil the night he went missing,
and I found this.
Kilo 3-6 Omega,
contact New York TRACON on one-one-niner point two.
Contacting New York TRACON on one-one-niner
point two. Kilo 3-6 Omega.
(wind whistling, clattering in background) That sound,
is that the snowstorm? Yeah, shh.
Okay. Now do you hear that?
Yeah, it sounds different.
So, one moment, it's super loud and then it goes quiet.
So I looked in to it and the time code skips.
It goes from 22 hours, two minutes
to 22 hours, 12 minutes.
Hello, what's up?
Nothing, I'm just...
obviously someone is trying to hide
whatever happened to those ten minutes.
(beeping)
Right? Correct.
So I'm going to find out who that is.
All right? All right.
Careful, brother.
So an ER doc from Windham Memorial
I.D.'d Neil from the pictures we sent. Did he check himself in?
No, but he dropped off a John Doe
two hours before Ghalib saw him.
This is definitely Neil. Do we have a better shot of the other guy?
No, that's the best we have.
What about his injuries? It's pretty severe.
He's got a broken arm, punctured lung,
shattered cheek bone.
Doctor thinks he was in a car accident.
Or... maybe this is the guy who went to Neil's house
and threatened him, and Neil kicked his ass.
Yeah, but then why would he drop him off at the ER?
I don't know.
(coins clinking)
(soda can hissing open)
Is this seat taken?
(sighing)
I'm sorry about what happened before.
If you don't want me knowing
about your personal life, that's fine.
But don't come to me and tell me that Anne's pregnant,
and then the next day act like I'm butting in.
I don't care what you do
with your personal life anymore, okay?
I don't.
If there was anyone...
that I was going to confide in...
...it would be you.
But I don't even know where to start.
ELENA: Jack?
I need you in the tech room.
Okay.
Sorry.
So ten minutes went missing from the transmission.
How did that happen?
It looks like at 11:15 that night,
somebody hacked the computer and tried to dump some files.
Let me guess: audio files, right?
Yeah.
So the system is designed to record transmissions
into a hard drive.
Whoever did this knew enough to lift the files and corrupt them.
And Neil was supposed to be handy with computers, right?
Fortunately for us, the computer creates a token table
of each file, so. based on another file from that program,
we can recreate the corrupted one.
When was this recorded?
It was three hours before Neil had the near crash.
(typing)
(beeping)
Zero Eight November, this is Burkhart Tower.
Please set alternative to 3014.
(over radio): Altimeter at 3014, Zero Eight November.
Zero Eight November, verify altitude at 1,800 and ident.
(over radio): Altitude 1,800,
Zero Eight November.
It's getting kind of rough up here.
(clattering over radio)
Zero Eight November, descend to 1,200; weather breaks at 1,500.
(clattering over radio)
Zero Eight November, acknowledge.
Burkhart Tower, do you read me?
Descending to 1,200, but visibility is zero.
(clattering)
Wait.
What the hell was that?
Zero Eight November, say again?
We hit something.
Mayday! Mayday! We're going down.
We are going... (explosion)
Zero Eight November, please identify.
Was he in the tower by himself?
Um, I think from 10:00 to midnight.
So he had plenty of time to hack into the system
and cover up the crash.
DANNY: Local PD is looking for the crashed plane
within ten miles of the tower.
So the John Doe that Neil took into the hospital
could have been on the flight.
Yeah, but if Neil was trying to cover that up,
why would he go and look for survivors?
Well, maybe he felt guilty.
ELENA: The plane that crashed is a Cessna 206,
and in the transmission, Neil says that the plane
was coming from Buffalo.
I called Buffalo,
and they have never heard of that plane.
Why would he lie about its origin?
Avoiding Customs?
Now listen to this one:
"Zero Eight November" appears in Neil's logs
every two weeks for the last six months.
Hmm.
(siren blaring)
Henry Fink?
I don't know who that is.
Nice try, Henry.
We took your fingerprints while you were under.
Who the hell are you?
SAMANTHA: FBI.
We're looking for Neil Rawlings.
I've never heard of him.
Um, Henry.
We know you're drug trafficking.
We have a warrant for your arrest.
We know that Neil was working with you.
Come on.
(panting)
It hurts.
Who else knew that Neil was involved?
Nobody.
This guy maybe?
Did you send him over to threaten Neil?
No drugs until you start talking.
Okay.
That's Charlie.
Him and me,
we'd fly the loads
in together,
and we'd drive them down the coast.
There's nobody else, I swear.
What about Neil?
He just alters the flight plans.
That's it.
Come on, it's got to be more than that.
The guy saved your life.
Saved me?
Mm-mm.
The only thing Neil saved was his own ass.
(wind whistling)
Neil? (screams)
Neil?
I thought you were dead.
Neil! Neil!
I can't... I can't move!
You got to get me out of here, man.
You should have thought about that
before you threatened my son.
I didn't.
It was, it was, it was Charlie.
Neil, Neil.
You can't leave me out here, man.
There's nothing I can do for you, man.
There's nothing I can do for you.
You got to get me out of here.
I'm bleeding out, you son of a bitch!
Don't leave me!
Neil!
Neil, shoot me!
Shoot...!
Shoot me.
There's a gun under my seat.
I'm gonna die out here.
All right, all right, just shut up.
I'm gonna get you out of here.
I'll get you out of here, all right? (grunts)
Shut up! Just shut up.
He strapped me to part of the wing.
(groans)
The only reason Neil
went back up there
was to get the emergency locator.
He would have left me up there if I didn't wake up, man.
Do you have any idea where the plane went down?
The mountains.
I don't know. I...
I don't know.
Can I please have my morphine back?
Sure.
Jack.
I got Neil's picture
out to airports and brought Interpol up to speed.
Good.
Do you really think he left the country?
Well, that's the next logical step.
I mean, ever since he crashed that plane,
all he's been doing is covering his tracks.
Well, except bringing Fink to the hospital.
That might have been just an attack of conscience,
which is not a good thing if you're a fugitive.
Doesn't mean he's not on the run.
Ever since this guy's wife died,
his whole life's just been spiraling.
He's made one bad decision after the other.
Just a question of time before he came unglued.
What about the son?
What about him?
You know, he's been so concerned about this boy,
you think he's just gonna abandon him
after everything he's been through?
I think he's so wrapped up in his own stuff,
he abandoned that kid a long time ago.
Doesn't matter how bad things get, I would never, ever,
in a million years leave my child, you know?
Agent Malone? Mm-hmm?
The guy from NTSB has some information for you.
Okay, thank you. (phone ringing)
I'll catch up.
Okay.
Delgado.
Hey.
Jack Malone, FBI.
Phil Hanson, NTSB.
So what do you make of that transmission?
Well, your ATC makes a lot of odd choices.
Odd in which way?
For one thing, he resets the pilot's altimeter
to the wrong altitude.
And the way he rerouted him
seems counterintuitive to the weather that night.
Is it possible he was drunk?
He doesn't sound drunk.
With his experience, I find it hard to believe
he'd make these kinds of mistakes.
So you think these decisions are intentional.
I don't have a better explanation.
Hey, Jack, excuse me.
So you know that Neil has been landing
Zero Eight November for the last six months.
Now, the plane has been flying into Burkhart for over a year.
Who was landing it before that?
ATC Ken Brown.
I think we need to talk to him again.
KEN: Omega 5-7 Bravo, switch to niner 7.2
for communication with NY TRACON.
Have a good night.
JACK: So Neil crashed the plane.
What plane?
Henry Fink's plane.
Who's Henry Fink? The same guy you were
landing drugs for six months ago.
What did you do to Neil Rawlings?
I didn't do anything to Neil.
But you know who did.
Listen, if he crashed that plane intentionally,
they're gonna lay it off onto you.
You're gonna need protection.
You got a family, right?
(sighs)
All right, look, Fink's people are crazy.
I tried to quit once,
and that Charlie guy set my RV on fire.
Why do you think I brought Neil in in the first place?
Hey.
I just got a call from Owen.
My water heater broke.
I got a foot of water in my basement.
No, go ahead, I'll cover for you.
(grunts)
All of Kirsten's stuff was down there.
I-I-It just... it doesn't stop.
Oh, man.
Sit down for a minute.
(grunts): Oh, my...
(sighs)
You know, last night I was heading home, and, uh...
I ended up right at the intersection where Kirsten...
I mean, how am I supposed to avoid that?
Probably can't unless you circle by Albany on your way to work.
I just sat... I sat there at the light
until someone came behind me and honked.
I just, I was just, I thought, you know, what if, what if,
what if she was, like, 15 minutes late, you know,
and the sun had already set?
Or what if the driver would have wore sunglasses or...
That's not fair.
Just, it's not fair, Neil.
No, it's not.
Anyway, now, to top it off, I've got to buy a new water heater
with money I don't have, because I gave it
to a hospital that couldn't save her.
I obviously can't change everything.
But...
I might be able to help with the money part a little better.
I laid out the whole thing for him,
and at first he said no.
But later he agreed.
Everything was fine.
Fine until he talked that plane into the ground.
Actually, three days ago, he came in wanting out.
JACK: Really.
What do you think changed his mind?
It was about his son.
I guess he got himself in trouble;
owed some bookie 5,000 bucks.
If that's true and Neil needed the money to bail his son out,
then why'd he give up the drug smuggling?
He had the money to cover the bet.
It was more about taking care of the kid.
What'd you say to him?
I told him Fink would never go for it.
But he didn't care.
He said he'd do whatever it took.
Why am I back here?
(clears throat)
What do you want from me?
Your mother is deceased, right?
Yeah.
My mother died when I was 16
and I was left with my father.
Really.
That blows for you.
Yes, it did.
How's it working for you?
You know, I'm not really interested
in some made-up story about how we're alike.
You know, after she died,
whenever I tried to talk to him--
about anything, something good, something bad--
all I'd ever see was the back of a newspaper.
So, uh, what, this is supposed to make me feel
like we're connected or something?
Yeah.
Yeah, because I get it.
I get how someone like you could get in so much trouble,
and $5,000 is a lot of trouble.
(scoffing): Like I know what you're talking about.
Let's just say that somebody had it in for you,
because you got yourself in a hole gambling,
and they had your father
and they wanted to harm him.
Now, I would need to know who that person was.
He's fine.
How do you know that?
How do you know it?
He came to see me.
When?
Right after I talked to you.
(sighs)
He told me all about the plane.
He was going to turn himself in.
You got away with it.
Why can't we just run? Because.
W-We can start over.
No, we can't, Owen.
We have to face reality here.
I killed somebody, son.
But he was a drug dealer, he--
It doesn't matter what he was.
I've got to take responsibility for this, do you understand?
I screwed up.
I let you down.
So now what?
What, you go off to jail and what happens to me?
Your Aunt Karen's going to take good care of you.
She can't. Yes, she can.
No, she can't!
I'm in the hole again. What are, what are you talking about?
I gave you the $5,000 to give them, to pay them off.
I thought I could double it.
How much do you owe them, Owen?
$13,000. Oh!
I don't have that kind of money to give them, son.
What am I going to do?
(groans)
What am I going to do?
Listen, listen, I'm going to fix this.
Okay? I'll fix things.
I will, I will.
He told me to wait to hear back from him.
What was the name of the person who you borrowed money from?
His name is Duke Bowden.
Okay, when was the last time you saw your father?
Around 6:00 p.m. last night.
Okay, I want you to wait here.
I'm going to send someone in to take care of you.
All right, okay, thanks.
Viv, Hudson PD just found Neil's Jeep behind Duke Bowden's house,
but, unfortunately, there's no sign of either of them. Well, you know
this guy's got a couple of priors for assault.
Maybe Neil tried to reason with him and it got ugly.
Or maybe Neil paid him.
But he didn't have the money.
Well, the drugs in that plane--
they're worth at least 13 grand. (phone rings)
Yeah.
Okay, thanks.
We found Bowden's car.
Nice.
Park ranger found Duke's car about an hour ago.
The engine was still warm, so I'm thinking
they maybe have about a 90-minute head start.
How are we doing on the search party?
Well, half the party's already out there.
We're good to go.
(helicopter whirring)
(indistinct police radio communications)
Okay, I've located the plane.
Should approach with extreme caution.
Copy that.
We got one down.
He's dead.
If they're carrying the rest of this, they can't be far.
Duke Bowden, FBI.
Keep your hands where I can see them.
I need help.
Keep your hands where I can see them!
I'm losing blood, man.
Where's Neil Rawlings?
I don't know.
Please, I need help.
If you want help, tell us where he is.
He's down there.
You should have warned me about that hole.
I didn't see the hole.
I told you we should have done this at daybreak.
Hey, I don't recognize this ledge.
We're going down a different way.
You trying to get me lost?
Don't be an idiot.
How much longer are we gonna be up here?
I don't know. I don't usually hike through the woods
with duffel bags full of dope.
Yeah, well, maybe that's why you brought me up here.
Help you carry this stuff and then... and then get rid of me.
I told you I don't want the drugs.
I think you do.
(metallic click)
(groans)
I crawled back up, but he hit his head on a rock.
He wasn't moving when I left.
Get him.
(helicopter approaching)
Rawlings.
I got Rawlings. He's alive.
This is Agent Fitzgerald.
Let's have the chopper remain on standby
for the landing zone coordinates.
(indistinct radio communication)
Copy that.
How you holding up?
I don't know.
Your dad has a slight concussion and some frostbite,
but other than that... he's going to be okay.
Is he going to jail?
Yeah.
That sucks.
Yes, it does.
I miss my mom.
I miss mine, too.
Dad.
(crying quietly)
Another happy ending.
Mm-hmm.
Anne lost the baby.